A target pigeon of the so-called Pro ZZ type and a launcher therefor of the Montefeltro 75 type are known from commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 4,077,384 issued Mar. 9, 1978 on an application filed June 3, 1976 as a continuation-in-part of application Ser. No. 604,069 filed Aug. 12, 1975 (now abandoned), and Ser. No. 762,019 filed Jan. 24, 1977 (now U.S. Pat. No. 4,133,532), both of whose disclosures are herewith fully incorporated by reference.
The system described in the above-identified applications and patent has proven to be an enormous improvement over the target-pigeon-launching machines known hitherto, as stated in some detail in Field and Stream of August 1977 at pages 102 ff. The complete system constitutes a shooting sport that is felt to compare favorably with wing shooting, and at the same time has the advantages of being legal virtually everywhere, which wing shooting is not, of being unobjectionable on ecological or ethical grounds, and being considerably cheaper than wing shooting.
The system has one main failing: it requires someone to attend and reload the machines. This has been necessary because the standard so-called Pro ZZ target pigeons each comprise a separate witness disk which is cup-shaped and secured by outwardly deflectable feet to a ring from which extend two diametrically opposite propeller-type vanes. A web diametrically bridging the ring is formed centrally with a doubly outwardly flared throughgoing hole and radially offset from this hole with two further recesses. A central beak of the launch head of the launcher must be fit through the cental hole and entrainment pins must be fitted into the recesses. Thus when the launch head rotates the entrainment pins will rotationally entrain the entire pigeon. When the pigeon is pushed off the beak a laterally projecting tip thereof laterally deflects the pigeon in a manner impossible to predict so that the trajectory of the pigeon resembles the random flight pattern of a flushed bird.
Furthermore in the known system positive locking means is provided in the form of two radially displaceable balls in the beak of the launch head. Thus to load a pigeon on the launch head the loader must operate a button to retract the balls of the positive locking system, then twist the pigeon over the beak and align the recesses with the entrainment pins, and finally release the knob to lock the pigeon in place. Although numerous attempts have been made, no machine has hitherto been designed that can perform this relatively complex succession of steps to load a pigeon on such a launching machine.
In the commonly owned and copending application Ser. No. 882,907 filed Mar. 1, 1978, whose entire disclosure is herewith incorporated by reference, a new target pigeon is shown and described which represents a considerable advance over the Pro ZZ pigeon, in that it can be reused, which the Pro ZZ pigeon cannot. Thus operating costs are reduced enormously, but the arrangement still requires at least one loader per range.
Such manual loading of the machines not only has the considerable disadvantage of entailing considerable labor expenses, but also requires a shooting range embodying the Montefeltro 75 equipment to be of relatively expensive construction, as a pit sufficiently deep to protect the loaders must be provided behind the arcuate array of launchers whose center is at the shooter's stand. If no such pit or ditch is provided, it is necessary for the shooter to open his piece, in accordance with proper shooting safety, for the loader to cross the field and reload the launcher that just operated. Thus considerable time, often at least a minute, must elapse between successive shots.